Ecommerce in 2026: What Australian Brands Should Actually Be Paying Attention To

The ecommerce trends worth acting on in Australia in 2026 are the ones that change where a brand spends time and money. Five stand out: customers are buying online more often but spending less per order, delivery is now part of the product, social content is doing more of the discovery work, AI tools are starting to influence what people find and buy, and marketplaces keep taking a larger share. Each one points to a practical decision, set out below. Most other "trends" can wait.

The figures in this article come from the Australia Post eCommerce Report 2026, which covers online shopping in 2025. It is the most useful single source on how Australians actually shop online, and it is worth reading in full if you run a store.

Shoppers are buying more often, with smaller baskets

Australia Post reports that Australians spent $82.6 billion online in 2025, up 14 per cent on the previous year, across 9.8 million households. Households bought from an average of 16 different brands and made four more purchases than the year before, while the average basket was $96, down $10 from 2020.

What it changes. Smaller, more frequent orders put pressure on margin per order, especially once delivery and payment costs are included. It makes three things more important: knowing your contribution margin per order, setting free-delivery thresholds and bundles deliberately, and getting customers to come back, because a cheaper second order is where the economics improve.

Delivery is part of the product

In the same report, 73 per cent of shoppers said a good delivery experience makes them more likely to shop online, 69 per cent wanted a wide range of delivery options at checkout, and 32 per cent said they would switch retailers to get out-of-home collection such as parcel lockers.

What it changes. Delivery options, costs and timeframes should be clear on the product page, not discovered at checkout. For bulky or awkward products, the shipping setup can decide whether the range can be sold online at all. For My Divine Home, a homewares and furniture store in Busselton, FORJ gave every product a shipping size and priced delivery by size and region, so larger pieces that could previously only be collected in store could be bought and delivered.

Content is doing more of the discovery

Australia Post found 60 per cent of shoppers use social media to discover products, and one in two had bought something after seeing it on social media.

What it changes. Creative volume and quality now carry more weight, because paid social platforms rely on a steady supply of good creative, and organic social and creators feed the same discovery. That means planning photography and video for every channel at once rather than shooting for the website and cropping the rest. We plan shoots from the channels backwards for that reason.

AI is starting to influence discovery and shopping

Australia Post reports that six in ten Australians use AI, and expects AI to influence up to 30 per cent of ecommerce transactions by 2030. That is a projection rather than a measured result, but the direction is clear: more shoppers will ask an AI tool for recommendations, comparisons and product details before they reach a store.

What it changes. The same things that help search engines also help AI tools: accurate, complete product data, clear product and collection pages, genuine reviews, and structured data that matches the page. Google Merchant Center feeds are worth getting right for the same reason.

Marketplaces keep growing

Australians spent $18.9 billion on pure online marketplaces in 2025, according to Australia Post, 23 per cent of total online spend.

What it changes. For many brands the useful question is how to use marketplaces well. Marketplaces can add reach and volume, but they also bring fees, price competition and less ownership of the customer relationship. A sensible approach is to decide which products belong on which channel, keep pricing and stock aligned, and use your own store for the range, content and customer relationship that marketplaces do not give you. BlueAnt sells through its own Shopify store and on Amazon in Australia and the US, and the BlueAnt case study shows how the paid media was structured when it launched direct-to-consumer.

Retention and recommerce

Two further findings are worth noting. Australia Post reports that 46 per cent of Australians buy second-hand goods each year and 73 per cent are interested in buying pre-loved or refurbished goods from retailers, while only 14 per cent of businesses offer it. Recommerce will not suit every brand, but for durable products it is a genuine opportunity few competitors have taken. More broadly, with smaller baskets, retention (email, SMS, post-purchase experience and replenishment) is where many stores have the most room to improve.

What we would do with this

If you are deciding where the next stage of ecommerce growth comes from, these are the questions we would answer first:

1. What is the contribution margin per order, and how do delivery thresholds and bundles affect it?
2. Are delivery options and costs clear before checkout, and do they suit the range?
3. Is there enough creative, in the right formats, to feed paid social and email every month?
4. Is product data complete and accurate enough for search, shopping feeds and AI tools?
5. Which products belong on marketplaces, and which should be kept for the store?
6. What brings a customer back for a second order?

Our article on the ecommerce growth levers we review before increasing ad spend goes through how those answers turn into priorities, and how we structure an ecommerce growth funnel shows how they fit together.

If you're deciding where to focus the next stage of ecommerce growth, we can review the store, acquisition and customer journey together. Our ecommerce work covers all three, with paid media for the acquisition side.